Robotics team advances to international FIRST Championship

STEM Early College High School’s robotics team “RHUMBOTZ” has advanced to the FIRST Championship in Houston after winning the FIRST Robotics Competition Alamo Regional tournament held at St. Mary’s University earlier this month.

The students had to compete against the 51 participating teams by forming an alliance with two other teams. Together, they performed various tasks with their robots to earn points.

With the help of their Coaches Romeo Valdez and Marco Mendez, the team designed, built, programmed and tested their robots to meet the engineering challenges. The students were judged based on their points earned, design excellence, competitive play and sportsmanship.

“I learned a lot from this competition,” junior Briana Olivarez said. “I learned a little bit about building, but I really learned a lot about managing a team and keeping everything on track, and overall team management and being a team captain.”

Junior Abraham Magallanez agreed and added, “I learned how to program Tank Drive in C++ along with watching and learning from [my teammate] Gavin Lewis programming the autonomous for the robot.”

The young innovators will now compete for the world championship title at the 2018 FIRST Championship, the world’s largest celebration of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) for students, on April 18-21 in Houston.

A total of 408 teams from all 50 states plus teams from India, Brazil, Chile, Australia, Turkey, Israel, Mexico, China, New South Wales and Canada will be competing to earn a championship spot.

“We are looking forward to meeting teams from different countries, and seeing how other teams made their robot,” Coach Valdez said. “The plan is to play as a defensive robot and support our alliance partners in whatever they need help with during the match.”

By participating in FIRST, students gain confidence to explore the innovation process while learning valuable science, engineering, technology, teamwork and problem-solving skills.

STEM ECHS’s robotics team is also one of 32 teams who were invited to compete at the Texas State UIL in Austin on May 18-19.